Of Grotowski with Schechner
Richard Schechner, a well-known American theatre personality, recently paid a visit toVaranasi to complete his second book on the Ramlila of Ramnagar. Famous for his production, "The Cherry Orchard" by Anton Chekhov, Schechner has great experience onthe theatre of Jerzy Grotowski. Here is a candiddialogue with the veteran. Does the younger generation of American theatregoers take a lot of interest in Grotowski's work? Sitting on the roof-top of a hotel overlooking the Ganga, he replies, "Somewhat yes and somewhat no." Grotowski, he explains, "is one of the four great directors of western 20th Century theatre. Stanislavski systemised a method he felt would help directors to be respectful of plays and actors to be truthful with regard to playing `life' on stage. Meyerhold demonstrated how to put something on stage. Brecht, a poet-playwright-director, showed how authorship, staging and social purpose could be joined. After Stanislavski, acting was changed, after Meyerhold, directing, after Brecht, playwriting. But after Grotowski? Around 1970 Grotowski decided to work either one-on-one or with very small groups, I was among those who complained that a great director was abandoning ship. But over time I changed my mind. I now believe Grotowski never left the theatre because he was never in it," says the founder of the performance studies department of New York University.
Grotowski died in 1999. And then only the theatre lovers knew that he had been living. They thought Grotowski was no more, for he was out of the scene. A bilingual Indian Journal, `Uphaar' first broke the news to the Indian theatre lovers.
Poor Theatre
"From childhood, Grotowski was attracted towards eastern philosophies, by the spiritual life it talks about," discloses Schechner. "When he was barely 20, at a time when such travel was difficult, he journeyed to Central Asia. Later, he made trips to China and India. When he returned to Poland after his first Asian sojourn, there were few options open for him with regard to his interests." "Process, not product" was more than a slogan. When Censors finally arrived, it was mostly to examine texts. And what texts did they receive? Grotowski, during his Poor Theatre phase, made montages from classical works - Polish, Greek, and Biblical.
Or he investigated well-known and virtually un-censorable texts such as Marlow's Dr. Faustus or Calderon's The Constant Prince. Oh, but how he treated texts - classical, Renaissance, and modern! He deconstructed them, rearranged them, used them as material rather than as finalities. His staging were, as he himself put it, scalpels with which to dissect the souls of the performers and the condition of contemporary European society and culture.
One wants to know from Schechner what is Grotowski's impact? "I suppose Grotowski deserved these well-meaning but misguided inquiries.
For more than 20 years he had worked nearly in secret. From time to time he appeared, made pronouncements, and offered interviews. He was well known and unknown simultaneously," Schechner explains.
GAUTAM CHATTERJEE
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